Cousins 1970 The Art and Science of Gnomonics

Richard Schmoyer’s Sunquest sundial was featured in the 1970 book by Frank Cousins entitled “Sundials: The Art and Science of Gnomonics” in the chapter on the “Correction for the Equation of Time” (Click here to download a pdf of the chapter).

“This fruitful idea reaches its culmination in the elegant design of Mr. Richard L. Schmoyer, Fig. 97, in which the style has a slot cut for both the summer and winter curve of the true analemma. The appropriate slot is turned into position and the time is read by adjusting the style for the minimum width of sunlight through the slot. Mr. Schmoyer prefers, in making the complex style, to lay out the Sun’s declination directly as seen from his plans shown in Fig. 98. The calculations are for a dial plate of radius 6 1/2 inches.”

SunquestSundial.org is an online educational exhibit about the Sunquest sundial, designed by Richard L. Schmoyer of Landisville, Pennsylvania in the 1950s. For more information, please contact Amy Roe at sunquestsundial@gmail.com